SCRIPTURE: Mark 4:1-9
God has a dream for this world, and He is planting the seeds to make it grow.
God’s kingdom dream involves transforming this world through love and kindness and mercy.
Jesus starts this revolution Himself, and He gathers others who join Him in this mission.
Some people reject the dream, but many people like it… until it gets hard or personal or demanding.
Similarly, many people were inspired by Martin Luther King’s dream, but not everyone joined in on it.
Risk, sacrifice, opposition, laziness, selfishness… all kinds of pressures lead people to not join in.
What is holding me back from investing myself in this dream?
I’m not talking about occasional, random acts of kindness, but a whole life committed to giving, serving, sharing, caring?
Practically speaking, today (and every day) I need to look for ways to help, to share, to care… I need to do it!
Those who embrace this lifestyle produce amazing results, and God’s kingdom dream spreads and grows.
What do you sense the Lord saying to you?
PRAYER
Lord, help me to see that being a Christian is more than being saved (a selfish motive). It is about joining You in the kingdom dream, and participating in the kingdom harvest. May my life produce this fruit!
Jesus follower
trying to find His way
Observations/Applications:
The people were ‘hungry’ for the word from the ‘Preacher.’ In this parable He used the image of the farmer to teach the lesson. They could identify with that. And we can today also.
The farmer preps the soil before he sows and he sows in order to have a crop. That is his livelihood. You sow in order to give increase – a yield greater than sown. The path, the rocky places, the shallow soil, the weeds are all inhibitors of the yield. Some are controlled but others he can’t. The farmer is joyous when the yield exceeds expectations.
So too is the Lord joyful when it is harvest time.
Prayer:
Lord of harvest, help me also this day be one who shares the seed of Your word that it may also produce fruit in its season.
Far and near the fields are teeming
With the waves of ripened grain;
Far and near their gold is gleaming
O’er the sunny slope and plain.
Refrain
Lord of harvest, send forth reapers!
Hear us, Lord, to Thee we cry;
Send them now the sheaves to gather
Ere the harvest time pass by.
Send them forth with morn’s first beaming,
Send them in the noontide’s glare;
When the sun’s last rays are gleaming,
Bid them gather everywhere.
Refrain
O thou, whom thy Lord is sending,
Gather now the sheaves of gold;
Heav’nward then at evening wending,
Thou shalt come with joy untold.